Day Two of Training

6/13
Wowzers was that the point of no return, from a fairly nice hotel with running water, snacks all the time, and the utmost comfort of being surrounded by English speakers, to complete and thorough confusion and a little too large of a crutch on Facebook messenger to maintain my daily grasp on the idea of functional language usage.

I moved into my host family's home on Sunday 6/13 and have been existing on vişine, chereşi, şi Google translate since. Also there's this puppy named Moți, who rolls in dirt and is adorable. We really get each other.

My host family is a couple with a son working abroad and another 17 year old son waiting to depart. He has expressed interest in me teaching him English so I'm hoping that will help us bond. The mother works in a similar field to my Community and Organization Development Program and I am hoping to bond on that commonality as well as learn more about such functions in the small Moldovan village setting. I still don't know what the father does and we don't speak much, but they seem comfortable with me as they lounge with our twelve cats so it's a solid start.

The house is very comfortable and clean, which is a large sense of pride here in Moldova. My room is on a second floor overlooking two joined rolling hills where I enjoy the view of farmers harvesting grapes for wine among other produce. Cherries, tomatoes, cucumbers, and potatoes are large here, and it is currently cherry season; so current that right now I am eating chereşi (sweet cherries, pictured below) while sitting next to the vişine (sour cherry) tree. We have also eaten a lot of chicken and fish lately, so I'm counting the days until I get to watch a chicken get butchered.

Language class has been absolutely exhausting the last two days, going four hours in the morning with two breaks. Yesterday I napped after class and today I napped at lunch. It's not good for my time adjustment but it's good for the soul so I'm not worried about it.

Our first technical training was today and it was a pleasant break to speak in English for a while. It's interesting how such an expected thing becomes a challenge overnight, and to such an extent that other challenges like training seem far more achievable.

After technical training I had tea (ceai) with my host mom and she said my language is improving... this was my first win! I'm still overwhelmed with the language but a slight improvement is all I need to know I'm getting somewhere!

Afterwards I watched my host brother play futbol with some other kids from the village. It was fun to watch kids have fun on the new field at the school, although the intermittent ploaie (rain) was an entertaining obstacle.

To make today the best day so far, I took my first bath since leaving Colorado, and it was the epitome of a perfect bath. Hot, comfortable, and so cleansing after a long day. As confusing and uncomfortable this language barrier may be, today was a win for me thanks to my host family. Mulƫumesc pentru toate.